


Memorandum

by fireflysglow_archivist



Category: Firefly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-08
Updated: 2006-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-29 13:44:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14473956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fireflysglow_archivist/pseuds/fireflysglow_archivist
Summary: After the war, Mal recieves one last letter from home.





	Memorandum

**Author's Note:**

> Note from alice ttlg, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Firefly’s Glow](https://fanlore.org/wiki/Firefly%27s_Glow), and was moved to the AO3 as part of the Open Doors project in 2018. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are the creator and would like to claim this work, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Firefly's Glow collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/fireflysglow/profile).
> 
>  **Author's notes:** Potentially disturbing, angsty, something death-ish. (Written for the challenge of 'Letters' at ff_friday on LJ.)

  
Author's notes: Potentially disturbing, angsty, something death-ish. (Written for the challenge of 'Letters' at ff_friday on LJ.)  


* * *

Memorandum

## Memorandum

Disclaimer: Firefly/Serenity? Not mine, never were, never will be. Joss/Universal/Fox/Mutant Enemy's toys, just rummaging through the box. 

* * *

Mal had known it would be waiting for him, ever since he'd learned of Shadow's fate. The broadwave in that dive of a bar had given him an atmospheric glimpse of blackened earth, and a cloying soundbite assuring that even now, the re-terraforming process was underway, muffled by half-drunken civilians and the clinking of glasses and the dull thumping against his ribs. 

It was a sort of twist in his gut, when the knowledge first crept in, like he'd swallowed a knot of barbed wire. If you asked for it, it wouldn't be there. If you didn't, it would slip into the corner, wait for your eyes to fall upon it and laugh at the shock it gave you. 

That little piece of his Mama that he'd carried in the back of his mind laughed at him. Since he had been climbing the trees when he knew he ought not to, she had been there, offering commentary where it was and wasn't needed. Probably before that, too. He'd heard her weary laugh, the rustle of the drover coat she'd hitch around her shoulders when the rains were coming, or feel a strong hand tightening on his shoulder reflexively. 

_Always the way things go, bao bei. You ask an' plead for it, let it chew up every spare moment in your day - an' it won't come, 'til you've gone and got yourself distracted and emptied out._

So, naturally, by the humors of all the 'verse, it would figure, half-crumpled in the back of his security box at this postal hub, that whatever spores of pollen or motes of dust that had settled in blots of Mama's crudely-made ink were probably all that was left of the Reynolds' ranch. Even when it had been handed to him, that tiny bit of denial that it wasn't really there had clutched his throat one last time, before falling and crumbling to ash. 

Weaving back through the passers-by at Zoe's beckon, he'd been clearly aware of it, tucked into a tear of his jacket's lining - made by the previous owner, it had served remarkably well for an emergency pocket. The rise and fall of his chest seemed to emphasize that little weight in there, pressed against his heart. 

Once holed up in their joint lodgings for the rest of the evening, the innkeeper's snide grin gone behind the slide of the door, he'd left his jacket hanging on the wall, all but forgotten until Zoe was fast asleep on the cot across from his own. 

He'd withdrawn the letter with a messy, all-thumbs clumsiness tearing at the seal. The paper was creased neatly threefold, and a line of swaying handwriting ghosted in reverse through the fibers. Slowly, he brought the paper beneath his nose - if Zoe had chosen that moment to awaken from another dream of the trenches, he would have given himself the kind of papercut to rival other men's moustaches. A long, suffocating moment passed, his gaze easing away from her dark curls spilling over her pillow, before he breathed in deeply. 

The sheet and envelope were undoubtedly sterilized, like everything else that went through mass physical mailings. He knew that much, easily, but telling himself that didn't dull the earthy smell of cheaply-pressed cellulose, like parched grass in the noonday sun. 

Holding in that breath, his lungs felt tight as drums, no less pained when he tucked the fold of paper back into the envelope. It scraped loudly, desperate hands on a cellar door as it slammed shut. Still folded, still unknown. 

As long as he didn't see what Mama had written down in those hasty minutes before she -- 

... _was dragged off into a gleaming transport, her coat spattered darkly with rain and the blood of an Alliance guardsman, her mouth a grim line and her eyes never once flicking up to the loft, lest they gave away the huddle of Independents barely resisting the urge to run to her aid_ \- 

... _slipped into blackness with a flutter of her heart, sprawled halfway-off a rickety cot in a crowded church-turned-makeshift-hospital, the woolen blanket sliding from twisted fingers_ \- 

... _had gone blind by the flash through the parlor window when she looked up from the pile of dirty dishes, with God's indifferent gaze turned away from home, and reduced to so much vapor before she ever felt the floor quake under her boots_ \- 

As long as Mal didn't know what she wrote, Mama had written down everything he needed to read.

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

 

Title:   **Memorandum**   
Author:   **Zephyr Oaks**   
Details:   **Standalone**  |  **PG-13**  |  **gen**  |  **4k**  |  **04/08/06**   
Characters:  Malcolm, Zoe, Other \- 'Mama' Reynolds   
Summary:  After the war, Mal recieves one last letter from home.   
Notes:  Potentially disturbing, angsty, something death-ish. (Written for the challenge of 'Letters' at ff_friday on LJ.)   
  



End file.
